"When I was five years of age, and during the sixth year, I suffered from nightmare. I sat up in bed and fancied I saw a monkey come down the chimney and fasten itself to my shoulder and bite me, and terrify me so that I would scream out. My older sister would then come, wake me up thoroughly, and satisfy me that it was but a vision. "Other nights I would feel a sense of oppression, ringing in ears, a sensation of perceiving something very small, which, gradually at first, and then rapidly, assumed enormous proportions and vast whirling speed, and which, I imagined, whirled me off with it--a buzzing in my ears, probably. Then would I feel that animals--rats--would creep over me and press heavily upon me, and I could neither move hand nor foot, nor speak." The reference to the buzzing in the ears is typical of the attitude that until lately has been taken by almost all physicians in respect both to adult and to juvenile nightmares. For that matter, it still is the attitude of those physicians who are not familiar with the findings of medical psychology. Nightmare to them, whether in the old or in the young, is altogether a question of physical causation. As they see it, one need not look beyond bodily conditions of some sort to understand the nightmares of adults and the night terrors of children. Accordingly, treatment by sedatives, dieting, and hygienic measures has been the rule. Unfortunately, this by no means always succeeds in bringing about the desired result, although such measures undoubtedly do benefit the general health. Seemingly, to be sure, they are especially successful in the case of night terrors. But it is significant that, even if left untreated, night terrors seldom persist beyond the period of childhood. Then, however, those who have had them show a tendency, in many cases, to be troubled by unpleasant dreams, often taking on the character of most distressing nightmares. The frequency of these may, or may not, be diminished by the usual treatment of a dietetic sort. On the other hand, observation has shown that many persons afflicted with the indigestion and other physical conditions commonly held responsible for nightmares are not troubled by nightmare at all. As one observer puts it, even a person whose stomach is half destroyed by cancer may commit all sorts of dietary indiscretions and not suffer from nightmare in the slightest.